Dems throw 4 Green Congressional Candidates off Illinois Ballot

I have found only two news stories on the removal of the Greens from the Illinois November ballot. The Chicago Daily Herald gets the number of candidates wrong, but quotes Green Party officials at greater length. The Pentagraph article includes some very nasty quotes from Democratic Party officials.

“Maurice Doyle, a Democratic precinct committeeman in Macon County, objected to Dennis’ campaign, alleging that the Green Party did not slate their candidates using proper party officials.

The other objectors, all members of the Democratic Party, made similar allegations against the other three candidates.”

[…]

Steve Brown, spokesman for Democratic Party Chairman Mike Madigan, said established parties should be expected to follow election laws.

“If Illinois has a set of election laws, we expect the Democrats and Republicans and anyone else who wants to be a candidate to obey those laws,” Brown said. “Usually this group whines every year when they fail to follow the law and get tossed off the ballot.”

Brown’s closing statement is beneath contempt as well as factually inaccurate. The Greens obtained major party status in 2006 when the Green candidate for Governor, Rich Whitney, obtained 10%+ of the vote. This is the first year that the Green Party has operated under major party rules.

But Andrew Finko, an attorney representing five Green candidates in board of election hearings, said objectors can file challenges on virtually no evidence.

“The concern is that any person can file a short, one-paragraph objection that challenges the other party’s nomination, effectively shifting the burden to that party to prove that everything was done properly,” Finko said. “Objectors are doing this when they have no basis in fact on which to raise the allegations.”

I haven’t seen the documents yet, but the best I can understand, the law says certain party officials that presumably were elected in the primary must do certain things. The problem is, in certain counties the Illinois Greens didn’t elect any party officers at the primary, so they improvised with a bylaw that says the state party can appoint those “missing” officials. It’s an example of laws being written with large parties in mind, laws that don’t match the reality for smaller ballot-qualified parties.